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The 2014 Midwest regional has been called the "group of death." And no wonder. The coaches in that that bracket have been to a staggering amount of Final Fours, and won an incredible number of championships. The top four seeds read like a who's who of last season, with three of them making the Final Four last year. The fourth was the preseason #4 team with a consensus first-team All-American, and they lost to the eventual champions last year in the Elite Eight. Going down the seedlines, you have the preseason #1 team with the so-called "best recruiting class of all-time," surprisingly good Tennessee and Iowa teams, and a tough defensive-minded Saint Louis team that gave us our toughest test of the season.
I've even heard some analysts call this the toughest regional since the NCAA shifted to the current 64 team format. But despite that, we call still survive and make it to the Final Four. For starters, there is no guarantee we'll even play the teams people are concerned about. Kansas State can beat Kentucky, Saint Louis can beat Louisville, and both Duke and Michigan could be upset. We like to imagine that we'll play all of the top seeds, but the tournament rarely sticks to the scripts we write for it.
Now, let's look at each of these dreaded matchups, starting with Kentucky. Kentucky is HUGE, at every position. Their starting backcourt is all 6'6", and their frontcourt is an intimidating 6'9 and 7'0. They don't get any smaller off the bench, bringing in a 6'8" SF and another 7'0" player, even sometimes running the tallest line-up in the nation at 6'6, 6'6', 6'8, 7'0, 7'0. We haven't played anything like that. But despite that, they haven't been able to exploit their size advantage very much. Their rebounding percentages (42.2% on offense, 70.1% on defense) aren't much better than ours (35.4%, 74.1%), and we are nearly identical at blocking shots (15.4% to 14.9%).
Meanwhile, Kentucky has positively struggled containing smaller perimeter players. They are #317 in the nation at stealing the ball, and Kentucky struggled to get good looks for its perimeter players, shooting 32.5% from beyond the arc. And in each of their 10 losses, they've let opposing guards light them up. Michigan State's Appling (6'1) and Harris (6'4) combined for 42. Baylor's Kenny Cherry (5'11) led them with 18. North Carolina's Marcus Paige (6'1) led all scorers with 23. Florida's Wilbekin (6'2) had 23 in their first meeting, while South Carolina's Brenton Williams (5'11) had 24. Even when they stop guards from scoring, they give them open lines for assists, like when LSU's Anthony Hickey had 11 points and 6 assists. Our strength is our ability to score from the perimeter, Kentucky's weakness is guarding it.
Louisville is a bit more formidable. On a neutral court, I would take them over any #2 or #3 seed, and might consider taking them over Virginia. But they rely on their ability to contain opponents backcourt threats and steal the ball. Unlike the teams they've been rolling, we have guards that can (and have) handled their pressure, and they aren't used to dealing with teams with a lot of perimeter options. When their press fails, like it did @ Cincinnati and @ North Carolina, they give up huge numbers to opposing guards (Marcus Paige had 32, while Sean Kilpatrick had 28). Memphis was able to beat them twice because Louisville could not contain all three of their perimeter options, whereas Louisville blew out UConn because of their reliance a single player (Napier). Even though Louisville is a VERY good team, we are one of the few teams that can match up well with their press. FVV actually matches up a lot better than Armstead did last year.
In the Elite Eight, we could face Michigan or Duke if they manage to make it that far. The teams are incredibly similar. Duke is #2 on offense, while Michigan is #3. On defense, Duke is #102 while Michigan is #104. Both rely on their shooting to win games, with offenses that get over a third of their points from beyond the arc. Duke has the best player, while Michigan is more balanced. But the key fact about both teams is that they are not complete teams. If they aren't shooting lights out from beyond the arc, they aren't going to beat us. Even if they do, they'll give us open looks and/or send us to the line (less so in Michigan's case). Honestly, this game looks easier than the game against Louisville, which isn't supposed to be a disrespect to either Duke or Michigan.
Finally, the #1 reason we can get out of this region is the top seed, Wichita State. We haven't just been playing good over our last few games, we've been dominant. Our starters have been out scoring opponents by over half a point a possession. We haven't been beating people by 40 like Louisville, but Louisville has simply been much more aggressive at pushing down their lesser competition, giving their bench about 60 minutes a game while keeping up their press. We've been going much deeper into our bench and avoided running up the score, consistently giving 4-5 bench players 10-20 minutes and rarely pressing with a lead. A very good case can be made that our starting five is the best in the nation right now, and they are playing at a higher level now than they have the entire rest of the season. To put it simply, if we play our best we can beat anyone.
TL;DR: This region is incredibly tough, but we can match up well against each other team. And right now, they should be asking how they are going to handle us even more than we should be asking how we are going to handle them.
I've even heard some analysts call this the toughest regional since the NCAA shifted to the current 64 team format. But despite that, we call still survive and make it to the Final Four. For starters, there is no guarantee we'll even play the teams people are concerned about. Kansas State can beat Kentucky, Saint Louis can beat Louisville, and both Duke and Michigan could be upset. We like to imagine that we'll play all of the top seeds, but the tournament rarely sticks to the scripts we write for it.
Now, let's look at each of these dreaded matchups, starting with Kentucky. Kentucky is HUGE, at every position. Their starting backcourt is all 6'6", and their frontcourt is an intimidating 6'9 and 7'0. They don't get any smaller off the bench, bringing in a 6'8" SF and another 7'0" player, even sometimes running the tallest line-up in the nation at 6'6, 6'6', 6'8, 7'0, 7'0. We haven't played anything like that. But despite that, they haven't been able to exploit their size advantage very much. Their rebounding percentages (42.2% on offense, 70.1% on defense) aren't much better than ours (35.4%, 74.1%), and we are nearly identical at blocking shots (15.4% to 14.9%).
Meanwhile, Kentucky has positively struggled containing smaller perimeter players. They are #317 in the nation at stealing the ball, and Kentucky struggled to get good looks for its perimeter players, shooting 32.5% from beyond the arc. And in each of their 10 losses, they've let opposing guards light them up. Michigan State's Appling (6'1) and Harris (6'4) combined for 42. Baylor's Kenny Cherry (5'11) led them with 18. North Carolina's Marcus Paige (6'1) led all scorers with 23. Florida's Wilbekin (6'2) had 23 in their first meeting, while South Carolina's Brenton Williams (5'11) had 24. Even when they stop guards from scoring, they give them open lines for assists, like when LSU's Anthony Hickey had 11 points and 6 assists. Our strength is our ability to score from the perimeter, Kentucky's weakness is guarding it.
Louisville is a bit more formidable. On a neutral court, I would take them over any #2 or #3 seed, and might consider taking them over Virginia. But they rely on their ability to contain opponents backcourt threats and steal the ball. Unlike the teams they've been rolling, we have guards that can (and have) handled their pressure, and they aren't used to dealing with teams with a lot of perimeter options. When their press fails, like it did @ Cincinnati and @ North Carolina, they give up huge numbers to opposing guards (Marcus Paige had 32, while Sean Kilpatrick had 28). Memphis was able to beat them twice because Louisville could not contain all three of their perimeter options, whereas Louisville blew out UConn because of their reliance a single player (Napier). Even though Louisville is a VERY good team, we are one of the few teams that can match up well with their press. FVV actually matches up a lot better than Armstead did last year.
In the Elite Eight, we could face Michigan or Duke if they manage to make it that far. The teams are incredibly similar. Duke is #2 on offense, while Michigan is #3. On defense, Duke is #102 while Michigan is #104. Both rely on their shooting to win games, with offenses that get over a third of their points from beyond the arc. Duke has the best player, while Michigan is more balanced. But the key fact about both teams is that they are not complete teams. If they aren't shooting lights out from beyond the arc, they aren't going to beat us. Even if they do, they'll give us open looks and/or send us to the line (less so in Michigan's case). Honestly, this game looks easier than the game against Louisville, which isn't supposed to be a disrespect to either Duke or Michigan.
Finally, the #1 reason we can get out of this region is the top seed, Wichita State. We haven't just been playing good over our last few games, we've been dominant. Our starters have been out scoring opponents by over half a point a possession. We haven't been beating people by 40 like Louisville, but Louisville has simply been much more aggressive at pushing down their lesser competition, giving their bench about 60 minutes a game while keeping up their press. We've been going much deeper into our bench and avoided running up the score, consistently giving 4-5 bench players 10-20 minutes and rarely pressing with a lead. A very good case can be made that our starting five is the best in the nation right now, and they are playing at a higher level now than they have the entire rest of the season. To put it simply, if we play our best we can beat anyone.
TL;DR: This region is incredibly tough, but we can match up well against each other team. And right now, they should be asking how they are going to handle us even more than we should be asking how we are going to handle them.
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